The present invention relates to a seat unit intended for example to enable disabled or elderly persons to sit down on and stand up from the seat more easily.
It is often found that disabled and/or elderly persons but also persons who may be suffering from various kinds of infirmity such as physical injury may find it difficult to sit down in and stand up from a seat, without calling on the assistance of another person. That may happen because the muscles of the person wishing to sit down or stand up are insufficiently strong or cannot be satisfactorily controlled, to raise and lower the body under full control over the whole range of movement between a sitting and a standing position.
While a seat may include a spring which urges the seat portion towards a raised position to assist the occupant to stand, it is found that the spring-loaded movement is difficult to control, even to such an extent as to `catapault` the occupant to the upright position, with severe loss of balance.